My opinion is it is a bad idea to stabilize pitch before installing the DC. Of course, it may depend on your climate. When I install a basic system here in the Pacific NW, it is common to get a 20 cent pitch drop a few weeks after installation. So your stabilization may go out the window. Since a basic system (50 watt rod and humidstat) doesn't cost very much it is certainly worth trying. We put quite a few of these in, but its rare that our humidity ever drops below 40 percent here. On Wed, May 5, 2010 at 9:40 AM, Michael Magness <ifixpiano at gmail.com> wrote: > > > On Tue, May 4, 2010 at 1:20 PM, Ursula Hammerling < > ursulapianotuning at yahoo.com> wrote: > >> Hi List, >> >> I have a customer with a 40 year old Baldwin spinet. When she acquired it, >> the owner told her, it had never been tuned. This piano is very unstable on >> 2 tunings a year. >> >> Does any one of you have experience with a climate control system in this >> kind of a case. >> I put climate control systems into other pianos with good results, but am >> not quite sure, whether it is justified in such a case, whether the tuning >> would become much more stable. Is this throwing good money after a hopeless >> piano? >> >> Thanks, >> Ursula >> >> >> Ursula Hammerling >> Registered Piano Technician >> 48 Winged Foot Lane >> Washington, NJ 07882 >> >> tel 908-835-0033 >> cell 908-507-1505 >> UrsulaPianoTuning at yahoo.com >> > > Hi Ursula, > I have to agree with David & James, the piano needs to be stabilized at > pitch first, a DC system isn't a panacea for pitch sabilization but rather a > tool to assist a stabile piano to remain so. > If it were me I would suggest tuning the piano more often initially in > order to stabilize it much like one would with a new piano. 3 or 4 times the > first year perhaps more if warranted, you don't say how flat the piano was > initially, pointing out to the customer it took 40 years for the piano to > get into this shape, it will take more than a few extra tunings to rectify > it. > > Good luck, > > Mike > > -- > > It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought > without accepting it. > > Aristotle (384 BC - 322 BC) > > Michael Magness > Magness Piano Service > 608-786-4404 > www.IFixPianos.com > email mike at ifixpianos.com > -- Ryan Sowers, RPT Puget Sound Chapter Olympia, WA www.pianova.net -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20100505/c1dfff63/attachment.htm>
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